A ranking Iranian judiciary official defended his country’s human rights record Saturday, lashing out at a recent State Department report that condemned the Islamic Republic’s record on upholding the rights of minorities and dissidents. “Claims by America and some European countries on the violation of human rights by certain states are not aimed at defending human rights, and they are rather used to exert political pressure on Third World and developing countries, especially the Islamic Republic of Iran,” Ebrahim Raisi, first deputy of Iran’s judiciary branch, told journalists in Tehran, according to the official Islamic Republic News Agency.
